Choose Moose

By David Benjamin

Sixth-grader Henry Haddock's personal war with School Board Chairman "Scooter" McDuff starts innocently. Over breakfast one day, Henry complains that his favorite teacher has been laid off in a sudden, sneaky burst of budget cuts.

Henry goes to ask the School Board to ask why. Scooter tells Henry to shut up. A week later, Scooter does it again. After that, it's a war of wills!

Henry's protest eventually triggers a brawl in the high-school library, a recall petition, a battered TV reporter and the unlikely political career of high-school basketball star "Moose" Fulton, brother of Fantasia, Henry's ferocious sidekick.

The town takes sides. Henry becomes the unlikely leader of the underdog faction—along with Moose and Fantasia, Charlie Mulcahy, Mr. McCloskey and the flamboyant Dexter D. Lee. Henry finds himself pitted versus the School Board, the "Thundering Three Hundred," the local radio station, the richest man in town, his sister Penelope and a German shepherd named Wagner.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Last Kid Books
• Release date: Mar 20, 2023
• ISBN: 9798986312996

Book preview

ROUND I:

HENRY HITS THE WALL

CHAPTER 1

16 AUGUST

Henry Haddock was incensed—and he said so.

Amy, the elder of Henry’s two sisters, sniffed the air histrionically and said, I can’t smell a thing.

Penelope, younger than Amy but nonetheless senior to Henry by three full grades in school, was more direct. She replied, What do you mean, incensed?

I see no smoke, said Amy. I smell nothing burning.

Henry Haddock made a growly sound deep in his throat and began: I didn’t mean—

Penelope broke in. "What did you mean?"

I meant that I was burned up, ticked off. Mad!

Insane then, offered Amy. Not incensed.

I’m not insane, snapped Henry Haddock, increasingly incensed. I’m ticked off.

Well, if you’re ticked off, said Penelope, "why didn’t you just say you’re ticked—"

Henry. Henry’s mother had listened long enough to her daughters teasing her son. She said, What’s bothering you?

What’s bothering me, said Henry, is somethin’ that should bother Amy and Penny, too.

I’m Penelope, replied his sister, who refused to be nicknamed, especially in honor of an insignificant unit of currency.

Henry, pausing to curl a lip at Penelope, said to his mother. They took away Ms. Webster, who was gonna be my art teacher.

Who took her away? demanded Penelope.

But Henry’s mother, Helen Haddock—who understood—nodded sadly.

I know, said Helen Haddock, in a tone of genuine sympathy. Henry’s mother was a teacher. Alice Webster had been one of her colleagues in the public schools of the town of Blackhawk.

For the first time in that morning’s breakfast conversation at the Haddock household, Penelope betrayed genuine concern. Took her away? Who took her away? she repeated. I love Ms. Webster.

The stupid School Board took her away, said Henry. Dumped her. Cast her adrift!

Helen Haddock chose not to correct her son’s harsh characterization of the School Board. She simply moved a morsel of egg from her plate to her mouth.

Henry glared across the breakfast bar at Penelope. Haven’t you looked at your class schedule, baconface?

Henry, said his mother warningly.

No, I haven’t! Why should I? replied Penelope. "School doesn’t start for two weeks. I don’t wanna think about school ’til then."

Yeah, well, you better check it out before then, Penny.

Penelope!

’Cause you’re not gonna have clarinet lessons with Mr. Hurst.

Yes, I am! I’m his favorite.

Well, he’s gone, clarinetface!

Who’s gone? Penelope looked stricken.

Mr. Hurst. They fired him, too, said Henry. He was both triumphant in his knowledge and incensed at its unfairness. They nuked the whole music department, lock, stock and tuba—except for the stupid marching band.

Wha-at? wailed Penelope.

Wait a minute, said Amy.

I’m afraid it’s true, girls, said Helen Haddock with a sigh. She began to explain to her daughters about the school budget. She said the School Board had begun to operate—just this year—under a very strict spending formula that had been mandated statewide by popular vote.

There was a referendum, said Helen Haddock.

What’s a referendum? asked Penelope.

Aw jeez, said Henry, you don’t even know what a referendum is?

Well, said Penelope, it sounds like a bird with a deep voice.

Well, it’s not, parrotface, snapped Henry. It’s a vote, on a law. A referendum, for your information, pelicanface, is a direct vote, by the people, on some issue or another. The senate and the state assembly can’t stop a referendum, even if it’s a rotten, dumb idea dreamed up by a lot of people who hate art and music, and French!

French? bleated Amy, wrinkling her brow.

Yeah, said Henry. He pointed his fork at his sister. No French for you.

No!

I’m afraid that’s true, Amy, said Helen Haddock. The Board reduced foreign languages at the high school to just Spanish and German.

You mean?

Yes, said Amy’s mother. Madame Celestine was let go, too. And Jeanne Brady, who also taught French. And Mr. Vricella, the Italian teacher.

And that ain’t all! Henry interrupted.

True, said Helen Haddock. Instead of two teachers in Spanish and German, there will only be one each.

Oh no. What about Herr Haushalter? asked Penelope meekly. He’s so cute!

Gone! Cute no more, snarled Henry. Kaput!

"Oh my God! No French! wailed Amy, reaching for her phone. I’ve gotta tell Tiff about this!"

Amy. There was a note of warning in Helen Haddock’s voice. Phones were strictly forbidden at mealtime.

Amy threw up her hands, But, mom! she cried. This is a crisis!

Hm, said Henry. Amy, dear sister, you look … incensed.

Oh. Shut. Up! said his sister, bolting her breakfast and fleeing the table.

For a moment, Helen Haddock sat silently regarding Henry and Penelope, still seated at the breakfast bar.

Penelope, almost fourteen and a freshman at Blackhawk High, was in the gangly stage of adolescence, consisting mostly of bones and angles, but with long auburn hair shiny with natural highlights that her big sister secretly envied. There were signs around Penelope’s eyes and lips that suggested she would grow up to be almost as pretty as her mother.

Henry, who would be entering sixth grade at the Blackhawk Middle School, was eleven, average in height for his age, with a wiry build, quick feet, subpar vision (and glasses that rarely went more than three weeks without a cracked lens or a mangled frame), freckles across his nose, a conspicuous gap between his two front teeth and brown hair kept right around hedgehog length because, when it grew out, Henry’s head became—according to his father, Ralph Haddock—the world capital of cowlicks.

Henry earned pretty good grades in school. He didn’t do quite as well as his two sisters because he had an independent streak that clashed occasionally with authority. His all-time worst antagonist had been his fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Reed. She had once summoned Henry’s parents to school to discuss his difficulties with self-restraint. Henry was, Mrs. Reed inferred, insufficiently socialized.

During that meeting, Mrs. Reed had done almost all the talking. Afterward, Henry and his parents were silent for a while. Henry wondered how much trouble he was in. His father, as he drove the family car out of the school parking lot, said, Hoo boy. Gene Debs, Clarence Darrow, Henry Wallace, Bernie Sanders and now, Grace Reed!

Ralph Haddock had a habit of dropping obscure historical references. He had grown up hoping to become a famous popular historian like Simon Winchester or Daniel Boorstin. But in college, his aptitude for chemistry proved so exceptional that he changed his career path and ended up a chemical engineer. Still, history was his intellectual passion. Henry was his protégé.

Ralph, what on earth are you talking about? asked Helen Haddock.

Socialism, said Henry.

Oh, for heaven’s sake, said Helen Haddock.

"Well, you heard what Mrs. Reed said, Helen. The woman’s a socialist all the way down to her red underwear. She wants Henry to be socialized, like health care in Canada and oil in Venezuela! said Henry’s dad. And more power to her. If the big political parties in America can’t manage things any better than they’ve been doing lately, maybe the Socialists—"

Oh, Ralph, enough! said his wife. That’s not what the woman meant by ‘socialized’.

But Henry’s father was laughing so hard that Henry started laughing, and pretty soon, his mom, too. And they all decided to take a detour to the Dairy Barn in downtown Blackhawk for a little ice cream socialism.

Three weeks after that parent-teacher conference, Henry turned in a theme about famous American socialists, for which Mrs. Reed gave him an A. By turning in his theme, Henry was making a roundabout play on words about socialization and socialism. Luckily, Mrs. Reed, who lacked a sense of humor, never got the joke. If she had, Henry might have ended up on the hot seat for another conference.

Henry’s dad was kidding around that day about socialism, but that conversation piqued Henry Haddock’s curiosity and marked the beginning of his interest in politics. Henry didn’t think he was personally a socialist (or any kind of an -ist), but he loved reading about grand old American rabblerousers like Eugene V. Debs and Mother Jones. Next thing he knew, Henry had started reading, cover-to-cover, both a daily newspaper and the local weekly, the Blackhawk Weekly Argument. Every day after school, he also logged online to other, bigger newspapers.

It was a story in the Argument that alerted Henry to the school budget bombshell. According to Argument editor Darren Flack, a recently passed statewide law had forced Blackhawk to reduce its property taxes, which provided most of the money to pay for public schools. The five elected members of the School Board had to make a cruel choice. They could either find new sources of income for the schools—which would be unpopular with voters if a tax hike was involved—or they could make drastic cuts in the budget.

As Darren Flack explained in his budget story, the second choice would also be unpopular. Politically, however, budget cutting was the lesser of two evils. To raise money meant raising taxes. Or, the School Board could try to pass a bond issue, which would require townspeople to vote on raising a large sum of money by borrowing it from investors and repaying it later (with another tax).

Flack wrote that the best thing, politically, about cutting expenses was that the Board could do it in the middle of the summer—at budget time—when no one in town was paying attention to the school system’s affairs.

But Henry Haddock was paying attention. He read the whole article in the Argument. Then he read it again, and he was incensed—not just because of the big spending reductions, but because the School Board had been so sneaky. Behind everyone’s back, the Board had dumped dozens of teachers and wiped out whole subjects, including art and music.

Henry was just beginning to reveal the horrific details of this catastrophe to Penelope when a cocoa-colored tornado roared into the Haddock kitchen, followed by a large dog.

What the HELL do they think they’re doing? shouted Fantasia Fulton, who was clutching a crumpled copy of her sixth-grade class schedule. Where the HELL is my gym class?

Helen Haddock would have disciplined her own children immediately had they spoken so profanely in her presence. But she had a soft spot in her heart for Fantasia.

Fantasia, my goodness! said Helen Haddock. Such language.

Aw, to HELL with language! cried Fantasia. Do you know what those pigface dog-doodies did?"

Helen Haddock simply gazed in amazement. Henry reached down to pet the dog, who belonged to the Fulton family. His name was Sarge. He was a gangly, tongue-floppy, caramel-colored Labrador with a wry smile and an easygoing disposition. Sarge looked up at Henry, hoping for food. Henry shared a crust of toast.

Fantasia continued to rage.

They fired Ms. Hayes, DAMN it! Fantasia replied. That’s what they did, those dogface pig—

Fantasia! I know, said Helen Haddock. Sadly but firmly.

I was just sayin’, added Henry.

Ms. Hayes? said Penelope. Ms. Hayes is gone?

Gone, DAMMIT! raged Fantasia.

So, no gym class? said Penelope. Good.

Penelope Haddock hated gym. Fantasia Fulton, on the other hand, loved it, and all the games kids got to play in gym class. She was a charter member of the Blackhawk Independent Baseball Organization (BIBO), which Henry had founded that very summer.

Fantasia’s explosive arrival in the Haddock kitchen was hardly unusual. She and Henry had been best friends since meeting—at age two—in Fantasia’s playpen. Henry, at the time, required the occasional babysitter. Fantasia’s mother, Delia Fulton, one day offered to watch Henry so that Helen Haddock could run a series of Saturday morning errands. Delia Fulton sat Henry next to Fantasia in her playpen.

Now, you two, she said, turning away, play nice.

But Fantasia saw Henry’s arrival as an invasion of her turf. She wrapped her hand around a Weeble policeman and gave Henry his first black eye.

They had been inseparable ever since.

I LOVE gym, DAMN it ALL! cried Fantasia, who had a tendency to speak in capital letters.

Hi, Fancy, said Henry, using the nickname he had invented at age two when he found himself unable to pronounce Fantasia.

Yo, Hank, said Fantasia, hauling herself up onto a stool beside Helen Haddock and shoving two slices of bread into the Haddock toaster. She turned grimly to gaze upward at Henry’s mother.

Mrs. H, she said. We gotta do somethin’ about this. They’re KILLin’ us here.

Helen Haddock smiled at Fantasia’s earnestness, but quickly grew serious again.

Oh, Fantasia, I wish we could. But I don’t know how …

Helen Haddock’s voice trailed off. She was clearly upset at the School Board’s budget cuts. She knew the harm they would cause for all the children in Blackhawk. She felt both relieved and guilty that she still had her own job, teaching second grade at Blackhawk Elementary. Mrs. Haddock was reluctant to make any trouble that might put her position at risk. Several School Board members, after all, had a reputation for vindictiveness. They especially did not like outspoken teachers.

Organize! said Henry, articulating the lessons he had learned from studying the careers of Sam Gompers and John L. Lewis. Collective action, public protest. We gotta do stuff like that.

Well, said Helen Haddock, collective action can be effective, Henry. But so far, you haven’t collected anybody. Have you?

Henry Haddock got the message. Being incensed all by yourself was pretty lonely. Plus, it was useless. He needed to either find other incensed people or he had to start incensing the un-incensed. He certainly needed more troops than just Fantasia and certainly not Penelope, whose commitment couldn’t be trusted. After all, Penelope was happy about the abolition of gym class. Moreover, she was in the high-school band, which took up a lot of her time.

I’ll help, said Fantasia.

Great, said Henry. Two sixth-graders. Big deal.

Even sixth-graders, said Helen Haddock very gently, are allowed to attend School Board meetings.

School Board meetings? asked Fantasia.

Yes, said Henry’s mother. Anybody can go. It’s public.

Public? asked Henry.

Yes, indeed.

Henry Haddock bounded from his stool. Yes! he roared. I’ll beard the lion in his den!

Huh? said Fantasia.

Lion? asked Penelope. What lion?

Helen Haddock just laughed.

Fantasia Fulton crossed her arms and gave Henry her severest glare. Boy, you read too DAMN much, she said. You better not be talkin’ like that to those School Board people.

You should talk, replied Henry ironically, about how to talk.

CHAPTER 2

17 AUGUST

For his first-ever appearance at the School Board, Henry Haddock was wearing clean blue jeans, hard shoes, his only white shirt, a Navy-blue crested blazer and a matching dark-blue tie whose only embellishment was a small, tasteful portrait of Bart Simpson.

When forced by his mother—one day at J.C. Penney’s—to choose a tie, Henry had been sorely tempted by the one on which Bart Simpson was pulling down his pants and mooning. Now he was glad he had selected the more understated image.

Henry was alone. Fantasia had promised to stand by his side. However, that afternoon, Fantasia had been apprehended by her father, Lt. Col. Lafayette Fulton, videogaming on her laptop during what he called restricted hours. This infraction had rendered Fantasia confined to quarters ’til the weekend.

Helen Haddock had volunteered to accompany her son. But Henry knew that opposing the School Board was risky for his mother. He had told her, no, he’d rather do this himself.

Henry had sacrificed a whole day of summertime baseball for the sake of this encounter. He’d gotten to the Blackhawk Public Library at opening time, and told Peg Bradner, the head librarian, that he needed to read up on the School Board. Ms. Bradner took Henry to the newspaper morgue, where he read back issues of the Weekly Argument both on paper and on disks.

Henry got to know, pretty well, who the School Board members were and how they thought about a lot of topics.

The Blackhawk School Board held its weekly meetings at 7:30 p.m. in the Blackhawk High School library, where six rows of folding chairs were regularly arranged, facing a broad table. Behind the big table, the five School Board members conducted their business and occasionally looked out at rows of mostly empty chairs. On that night, besides Henry, there were only a few spectators, including Buzz Skelton, one of the middle-school teachers. Henry knew from reading the Blackhawk Weekly Argument that Mr. Skelton monitored the meetings for the teachers association.

Henry, who was prepared to speak when called upon, sat right up in the first row, in the middle, facing the spot where the Chairman, Farrell McDuff—whose lifelong nickname was Scooter—would be sitting if he were there. Scooter McDuff had not yet arrived when Henry entered the room. In fact, only one member, Mrs. Annabella Moss, had gotten to the meeting ahead of Henry.

Mrs. Moss peered curiously at the boy in the front row. After a moment, a light shone in her eye and a smile creased her already creased (but amiable) face.

Henry?

Henry, squirming a little, met Mrs. Moss’ gaze.

Henry Haddock?

Um. Yeah. I mean, yes.

Oh, Henry, you rascal. You’ve gotten so tall!

Tall? thought Henry. Boy, didn’t he wish he was tall.

Henry, come up here.

Henry approached Mrs. Moss, who had been his third-grade teacher many years before—as well as Amy’s and Penelope’s third-grade teacher, and third-grade teacher to kids in Blackhawk going back roughly to Paleolithic times.

Several years ago, Mrs. Moss had retired, and—loath to just sit around feeling my arteries harden—she had run for School Board. And won. And then, just this past April, she’d been elected to a second term.

Mrs. Moss, as Henry knew from reading the Argument, was the only member of the Board who had voted against the huge budget cuts.

Tonight, Annie Moss didn’t talk about the budget to Henry. She asked about Amy and Penelope and insisted that Henry say hello to his parents. And she enthused about how big and handsome Henry had become.

Henry answered all Mrs. Moss’ questions politely but he felt self-conscious, especially as the other School Board members began filtering into the library, taking seats at the big table and looking curiously—and not in a very friendly way—at the kid shmoozing with Annie Moss.

Henry was eager to return to his seat, but Mrs. Moss was still asking questions. Finally, she said, Henry, I must say I’m surprised to see you here, of all places. What on earth—

A loud and forceful throat-clearing sound, rumbling from the depths of Chairman McDuff, interrupted Mrs. Moss. She winked at Henry and whispered, We’ll talk afterward, all right, Henry?

Henry returned to his seat, with alacrity.

Scooter McDuff, whose moniker went back to his school days as a tight end for the Blackhawk High School football Blackhawks, seated himself widely and ponderously. He reached for his gavel.

This meeting of the Blackhawk School Board will come to order.

For the first half hour of the meeting, Henry barely heard a word exchanged among the Board members. He had read about them. He had seen each of them around town from time to time. But, in places like the Blackhawk Cash Store or the All-State Truck Stop Diner, they seemed like ordinary people. As members of the town’s second most important deliberative body (some said the School Board was number one, more important than the Board of Aldermen), they looked different to Henry. Even Mrs. Moss seemed somehow larger and weightier than normal, even a little scary.

Viewed from Henry’s left, the Board members were Randy Zink, who’d been selling insurance for State Farm since his graduation from Blackhawk High eighteen years before, Lyle Lehnherr, who worked at the Farmers & Merchants Bank, Chairman McDuff, proprietor of McDuff’s Monster Tire Depot, Mrs. Moss and—farthest to Henry’s right—Darlene Gazelick, who didn’t work outside the home because it was against her religion.

From his library research, Henry knew that Chairman McDuff was the talkingest—and shoutingest—member. He bullied everyone, especially Randy Zink, but was careful not to antagonize Mrs. Moss. Mrs. Gazelick, whose opinions were very strong, offered frequent proposals to reform the schools, mostly by having students pray in class, study the Bible and practice abstinence. She also wanted to remove a lot of books she thought were indecent.

Henry knew also that Mr. Lehnherr called himself a financial expert, probably because he worked at the bank. He always favored spending less money on schools, never more. He was the main author of the list of teachers who had been fired. Henry stared hard at Mr. Lehnherr, searching his face for signs of malice and heartlessness. But all he saw was a squinch-faced man in his thirties, with wavy brown hair, walrus whiskers and watery eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. He had a shaving cut on his chin.

Henry actually liked Lyle Lehnherr’s face—for artistic reasons. It occurred to Henry that if he ever came to another School Board meeting, he should bring along his sketchbook.

It took Henry an hour or so, but he figured out what was going on. This was the Board’s first meeting after many weeks of budget talks. So, Chairman McDuff put the Board to work catching up on old business, none of it very interesting. As 10 pm approached, the audience consisted entirely of Mr. Skelton—who was obligated to be there—and Henry. A news stringer for the Argument, a student from Coulee Junior College just up the road from Blackhawk, had spent a fidgety hour in the audience and then departed.

Henry was getting a little drowsy.

But he sprang back to attention after the Board voted unanimously on something and Chairman McDuff said, Okay then. Let’s get on to new business.

Instantly, Henry raised his hand.

Chairman McDuff ignored Henry.

Henry waved his hand.

Chairman McDuff kept his